Ohio has had its share of high-profile exotic animal cases over the years. Born Free USA, a
group that tracks exotic-animal escapes and incidents in the U.S., said Ohio has had 84 incidents
since 1993. Among the more recent, notable ones:

September 2011: John Kokas, 80, was seriously injured by a full-grown kangaroo at Kokas
Exotics, an animal farm in Marion County village of Green Camp. Kokas was recently released from
the hospital and the kangaroo that attacked him remains at the farm.

September 2010: Brent Kandra, 24, died after he was attacked by a bear he was feeding at an
animal farm southwest of Cleveland owned by Sam Mazzola. Mazzola, who died in July during what
authorities said was a sexual game gone bad, had long run afoul of authorities with his menagerie
of bears, wolves, tigers, lions and coyotes. The bear that killed Kandra was later euthanized.

May 2009: A 10-year-old girl in Columbiana County was mauled by a mountain lion kept as a pet
by a friend's family. The child recovered; it was unclear what became of the animal.

November 2008: A pet bear escaped its cage near Marengo in Morrow County and went to the front
porch of a neighboring home. The bear's owner, Harry Wilson, arrived and shot and killed the animal
when it charged him.

September 2008: Morrow County deputy sheriff Stuart Mattix shot and killed a nearly 500-pound
black bear that had escaped from its cage at a home just south of Mount Gilead. Mattix was bitten
but recovered.

November 2007: Terry Brumfeld was coaxing his 550-pound pet lion back into a cage at his Pike
County home when the animal ran off and approached cars driving on Rt. 23. No one, including the
lion, was injured.

May 2006: A 400-pound black bear escaped its enclosure at the Grand River Fur Exchange breeding
farm in Ashtabula County and attacked a 36-year-old woman at a neighboring house.

May 2006: A fire killed a grizzly-bear cub, two tiger cubs and two iguanas at a long-embattled
exotic-animal farm in Summit County.

September 2005: Marion resident Michael Jolliff nearly died after being bitten by a Western
diamondback rattler, one of about 200 snakes the breeder had in his home.

September 2005: A 30-pound, three-foot-tall Patagonian cavy escaped from an exotic-animal farm
in Clark County. It was on the run for 12 days before it was struck by a vehicle along Rt. 41 and
killed.

July 2005: A macaque monkey escaped its owner in Noble County, then jumped into a nearby pickup
truck and bit a man.

May 2004: A Butler County woman was bitten by her father’s lion and the animal had to be shot
and killed to free her.
Source: Dispatch research, news archives, Humane Society of the United States